It’s actually quite difficult to brew moonshine that’s good enough to drink. All those old stories about going blind off of home brewed moonshine are from methanol poisoning.

this isn't true and I wish the silly urban myth would die already. Ethanol is preferentially metabolised (competitive inhibition) over methanol, the only way to have enough methanol in home distillation to cause poisoning is if methanol has been deliberately added.

Apologies for the reddit link, but here is a fairly good writeup of the whole thing:

https://www.reddit.com/r/firewater/comments/cv4bu8/methanol_some_information/

What was the whiskey rebellion about? Oh well guess it doesn't matter

I also think about all the folks I know and who would try to distil liquor vs who is smart enough to do it right. Honestly this feels like thing that should be local laws. I feel its a bit like guns. The higher the density the more likely you want to restrict it or at least permit it.

The 2026 realist in me is trying to figure out how this turns into a big juicy bone for the existing entrenched industry players.

The distilled spirits law was from 1868. Other "Reconstruction era" laws passed, that could be targets:

• 1868, the 14th Amendment to the Constitution guaranteeing birthright citizenship, due process under the law, equal protection
• 1866, Civil Rights Act of 1866 was the precursor to the 14th Amendment. The Civil Rights Act protected formerly enslaved people.

We know modern Republicans don't like either one of these things and think they should be abolished.

Long time hobbyist home brewer here. Nobody is stopping you from home distilling. The required gear has long been publicly available. With either boozy category, one doesn't take up this hobby to save money. There's a large investment in gear and time to get it done.

It's taken me close to 10 years of home brew experience, and probably over to $20k in supplies and equipment over that time to make beer that's on par with craft breweries... 5 gallons of beer at a time.

The conversation ratio on mash to beer is mostly beer. The conversation ratio on mash to finished drinkable liquor is a joke in comparison. Multiple distillations if you want something that's at best bottom shelf. Forget about aging.

Take that ‘libertarian’ and kill it.

The accelerationist in me says fuck yes, let these morons methanol themselves to death

They're probably against it. Diageo wants you buying from them.

Why? People should do what the fuck they want. Are we really going to attack hobbyist for tax evasion right now?

There are some billionaires whose taxes need to be reviewed in a serious way.

It's one of those technically illegal, no one enforces it unless you decide to sell it without a license.

You can, but its the distribution that causes things to get weird.

You can

I've been making my own wine for years. Nobody cares.

For all ya'll disliking this, I can buy chemicals off ebay where a whiff can give you super cancer, i can own large construction equipment without permits and use it as long as its on my own property. I think distilling alcohol is fine

There's several other countries with a thriving legal home distillation scene, New Zealand being one of the more commonly referenced ones, that disprove the danger.

Ethanol is actually a treatment option for methanol poisoning, plus the amount of methanol is quite low in fermented grain and fruit alcohols to begin with and, despite what people believe, is not concentrated in the heads so even forgetting to remove the heads doesn't increase the risk of methanol poisoning.

The amount of ethanol vapor in air is also quite low. Many hobby distillation sets also use immersed electric heating elements as they're way more efficient so igniting ethanol vapor is less risk than you might think.

Just keep some store bought vodka on hand to ease the methanol woes

This is one of the those cases where the regulation is there to help the big corporations by preventing competition, not protecting the little guy.